Paleontology

Little is known about the early hunter-gatherer populations that lived on islands in Southeast Asia, as human remains from the Late Pleistocene and early Holocene are extremely rare. The Niah Cave in the northeast of Borneo has been identified as…

Engraved stone artifacts can provide important insights into the history of human culture and cognition. However, it can be difficult to determine the action that created an incision: was it an accidental scrape or purposeful engraving? To address this issue,…

Parasitic worms that infect the human intestine lay eggs that are later excreted in feces. These parasites might spread from human to human, or they may be passed from intermediate animal hosts, such as pigs or fish, via meat consumption…

If you’ve ever seen a sea turtle, you’ll not be surprised to hear that these creatures have ancestors dating back to the times of dinosaurs. One ancestor of modern-day sea turtles, Peritresius ornatus, lived in North America during the Late…

The horseshoe crab, Limulus polyphemus, has unique anatomical features and an ancient lineage, which is why it’s sometimes referred to as a “living fossil.” Most images captured of Limulus and other invertebrates are two dimensional, so Russell Bicknell from the University…

The authors of a recent PLOS ONE study describe a small dolphin skull discovered in Ecuador, which they identify as belonging to a new species based on its facial features. Previous dating of the site where it was found allowed…

In a new PLOS ONE study, Guntupalli Prasad and colleagues announce the discovery of what is thought to be the first Jurassic ichthyosaur found in India. The 5.5-meter-long marine reptile likely ate shelled marine animals known as ammonites and…

One of the most extensive assemblages of human bones from Europe’s Magdalenian culture (which lasted from about 12,000 to 17,000 years BP) can be found at Gough’s Cave in Somerset, U.K. Many of these bones bear cuts and damage, but…

H7N9 bird flu mutations could enable spread between humans In a new PLOS Pathogens study, researchers analyzed genome mutations that could occur in the H7N9 strain of avian influenza, which occasionally infects individual people but does not spread between humans.…

Approximately 250 million years ago, the Permian mass extinction killed off 90 percent of species on earth. Which vertebrates lived in the years following the Permian extinction, and what can that tell us about their recovery from this devastating event?…